Day five went along without any real upsets, as all the top stars won their matches without much difficulty.
Novak Djokovic won his 17th straight match at the Australian Open as he got by Radek Stepanek 64 63 75. It was a solid match from the #1 overall, and he did what he needed to do to win. It was like a classic Federer early round match, in which he did not expend much energy and upped his game in the tail end of sets to win each one. He will take on Stan Wawrinka in the round of 16, who took out the last American Sam Querrey in straight sets.
Janko Tipsarevic needed 5 sets again to advance to the round of 16, beating Frenchman Julien Benneteau in a match where he was down two sets to one. Believe it or not, it was Janko's 10th 5-set match in 19 career matches played at the Australian Open. Crazy! It's likely he may play another 5-setter next as well - he takes on Nicolas Almagro, who took out Paris finalist Jerzy Janowicz.
David Ferrer eased through Marcos Baghdatis in straights, and he'll next play Kei Nishikori, who took out Evgeny Doskoy in straights. Kevin Anderson came back from two sets to one down to beat Fernando Verdasco, and he'll have the tough task of beating Tomas Berdych in the 4th round, who manhandled Jurgen Melzer with the loss of only seven games.
On the women's side, Maria Sharapova finally lost a game. She defeated Venus Williams 63 61 in the first night match and looked very good. Her game streak was broken at 28 after Venus held down 4-0. Maria was up 5-1 in the 2nd but was broken and Venus almost fought back to even but the Russian was too strong in the end. Maria is the heavy, heavy favourite against Belgian Kirsten Flipkens in the 4th round.
Agnieszka Radwanska remained unbeaten in 2013 with yet another easy win, this one over Heather Watson. She'll play Ana Ivanovic, who took out her compatriot Jelena Jankovic in straights. Li Na and Julia Georges set a date with one another after wins over Sorana Circstea and Zheng Jie respectively. Angelique Kerber ended the run of young American Madison Keys, and Ekaterina Makarova upset Marion Bartoli in three sets.
Day 6 features the heavily-hyped Federer vs Tomic match, as well as an all French-battle between Gael Monfils and Gilles Simon. Serena Williams, Andy Murray, Juan Martin del Potro, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Victoria Azarenka, and Caroline Wozniacki are also in action. Also, watch out for Sloane Stephens vs Laura Robson - should be an exciting and competitive match.
On a side note to wrap this up, how good have the top players been on both the men and women's side? Djokovic, Federer, Murray, Ferrer, Serena, Sharapova, Azarenka, del Potro, Radwanska, and Berdych all look incredibly sharp right now.
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